


Puppy Love

by Copperscales, muggle95



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Almost Gay Awakening, Before it all went wrong, Class Differences, Collection: Purimgifts Day 1, F/F, First Crush, Gay Awakening, Hair Brushing, Kinda, Lady the direwolf (Game of Thrones), Puppy Love, and with hints that it won't go so wrong, mutual crush, optimistic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-04
Updated: 2020-03-04
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:28:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23010202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Copperscales/pseuds/Copperscales, https://archiveofourown.org/users/muggle95/pseuds/muggle95
Summary: Sansa thinks about her marriage prospects. She's not as happy as she feels she ought to be.
Relationships: Sansa Stark/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 14
Collections: Purimgifts 2020





	Puppy Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mihrsuri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mihrsuri/gifts).



"Joffrey is going to fall in love with me and we will be happily married," Sansa had told her sister earlier that day. Arya had scoffed, calling him stuck up and selfish and worse.

Sansa had mocked right back. Arya was a foolish child, always trying to pretend she was a boy with Jon and Robb. Why couldn't she see that _any_ sensible girl of compatible age and birth, as Sansa and Arya both were, ought to love the idea of marrying the crown prince.

And Sansa did love it. The idea. She hated to admit, but Arya, silly Arya, was right. Joffrey was conceited and self-centered and thoroughly repulsive despite his pretty face 

But of course she loved the idea of marrying... well, maybe not Joffrey in particular, and not even his brother Tommen who was such a _child_ , just like Bran, Bran whose disregard for the rules had cost him dearly - no she didn't like to think about that - Tommen was an immature child like _Arya_. Arya who refused to accept her place in life. Yes, Sansa loved the idea of marrying the crown prince.

Gods, that dream had been far easier to maintain before she'd actually met the Barratheons. Now instead of a perfectly noble, masked knight to sweep her off her feet, or a faceless "Prince Joffrey", or a boy who looked mysteriously like Amrie (the serving girl that always seemed to simultaneously irritate and sooth Sansa for reasons she couldn't figure out. Septa Mordane had advised that perhaps she was jealous but certainly Sansa wasn't _jealous_ of Amrie's low status and bland wardrobe) now when Sansa tried to imagine herself wooing and wedding Prince Joffrey, even if she focused on adding him to the daydream, she found herself picturing his sister Myrcella instead.

And because _No Call Goes Unanswered_ , as Septa Mordane often warned, Amrie was suddenly at the opening of Sansa's tent, as though summoned by Sansa's very thoughts, calling for permission to enter.

Lady was already on her feet, tail wagging, but not bowling Amrie over as Nymeria would have, just standing obediently, albeit eagerly, at Sansa's side.

"You may enter," Sansa invited, more aware than usual of the way her spine instinctively stiffened into the more formal posture she had long been taught to use around her inferiors. Today, her usual decorum felt uncomfortably tense.

Amrie set Lady’s dinner on the ground and leaned down to pet the direwolf’s soft ears. Sansa couldn’t help but watch her long, graceful fingers, always so deft and quick with a needle, so gentle when braiding her hair.

”Is there aught else you require, milady?” Amrie asked, giving Lady one last fond pat as she stepped back. Sansa suddenly found herself loathe to return to her melancholy reflections.

“Please braid my hair, Amrie. I’d like it to be curled for tea with my betrothed tomorrow.” Everything had to be perfect. Then Joffrey would fall in love with her (and she with him) and everything would work out perfectly, just like the storybook tales.

Amrie obligingly took Sansa’s comb and pulled up the second chair to her back, meeting her eyes in the small looking glass propped on the table. “Did you notice the embroidery on the queen’s bodice? I wouldn’t know what to do with that much gold thread, and the beading…” she trailed off with an admiring sigh.

Sansa nodded. The dress had been adorned with roaring lions made entirely of varying shades of citrine and topaz beads. Like all daughters of noble families, Sansa had been working on the embroidery for her eventual wedding gown since she had been proclaimed proficient with a needle. Arya was _still_ practicing on old handkerchiefs, but Sansa had been working on her gown for years now, and even so, the embroidery on Queen Cersei’s gown intimidated her when she thought about trying to produce it herself. Still, Amrie’s admission of the same surprised Sansa. Despite her young age, only a year older than Sansa, Amrie was one of the best on staff at tailoring — or mending, in the case of Arya and Br- Arya and the boys — the family’s everyday clothes.

“It must have taken _ages_ ,” Sansa agreed aloud. And, well, if _Amrie_ could admit she wouldn’t know how to make such a fabulous dress… “I wouldn’t know where to start either,” Sansa admitted. It wasn’t shameful that she was less skilled than someone older and with more practice.

Amrie snorted, a grin tugging at her lips. “I suppose it’s just as well I shan’t wear such a thing; I’d be so afraid of ruining it I wouldn’t move a muscle.” Sansa pictured Amrie in a fine silk gown and inexplicably blushed. Amrie would look best in green, she supposed, to match her eyes.

“Southern fashions seem like too much trouble, for all they’re lovely to look at,” Amrie concluded, as she proceeded from combing Sansa’s hair to braiding it.

A pleasant chill ran down Sansa’s back, and she found herself relaxing, very improperly, into Amrie’s gentle touch. Amrie hesitated for the slightest moment, before continuing, deft fingers catching the loose hairs and pulling them neatly together, tightly, but never painfully.

Once Sansa’s hair was braided tightly and wrapped in a scarf so it wouldn’t come loose as she slept, Amrie pronounced her finished.

Amrie stepped away to gather Lady’s bowl, but she turned back before picking it up. “If I may be so bold, m’lady...” She hesitated, and Sansa nodded, granting permission to continue. “If the Prince does not recognize how lovely you are, he is as blind as a day-old kit.”

The compliment warmed Sansa in a way that Joffrey’s intermittent attention had not. “Thank you, Amrie.” Sansa felt herself blushing again, but she felt oddly relieved to see a pink tinge dusting Amrie’s cheeks too, a lovely mirror image.

Where had that thought come from?

Amrie appeared to be taken similarly off balance by the interaction, and she scooped up Lady’s dish too quickly, fumbling it before regaining her grip.

“Sleep well, m’lady,” Amrie wished her in parting, before stepping hastily out of the tent, leaving Sansa, once again, alone with her thoughts.

**Author's Note:**

>   
> 


End file.
